While the science side of the recent Turkey 7.2M and New Zealand 7.4M quakes is on the Apocalypse string, here is the human side:

http://xfinity.comcast.net/art...EWS-US-TURKEY-QUAKE/

The guess curently is that over 1000 have been killed in Turkey.

Donald

Interim note

Israelis stopped a terrorist gang from using a major bomb apparently on a big southern Israeli city. It was detonated harmlessly.

America burns Korans at USAF base in Afghanistan. That nation erupts in carnage and riots, which continue. That Taliban are having a field day in provocation of Afghans, against America, of course.

I have been part of a senior health HMO for many years. This month I finally agreed to a home visit by a nurse who took my health history and did a cursory physical. The data will be on the computer, but what busy doctor wants to read an encyclopedia volume in 15 minutes or less?

The death of Whitney Houston epitomizes the road modern music is taking. Young, very talented, gone. I visit Whitney home for the aged as part of my weekly musical visits. A favorite resident died there too, last week. She could name many of the tunes I played.
A neighor college grad female criminologist on her own found out about rape and pregnancy the hard way...guess the name.

Our resident RC archbishop epitomized how that church reaches out.
On TV he was seen placing a non-demoniational charcoal cross on inmate foreheads.

Then there is the current uproar of Obama apologizing for a USAF base commander in Afghanistan because in cleaning out a library they burned Korans, with riots and other carnage whipped up by Taliban... Then there was the uproar here over abortion, again, with Obama doing some apple polishing.

I heard the other day on the radio, that America could be in total disaster in a week, whenever. I may be overstating, and haven't yet found a readable reference it. I have no timeline as to when.

The subject is still pertinent.

Donald

quote:

The death of Whitney Houston epitomizes the road modern music is taking. Young, very talented, gone.

Houston was 48 when she died. Talented, yes. Young, no.

Why call this the road modern music is taking? There have been plenty of popular singers/musicians who overdosed and died. If Houston died from drugs (there's no official cause of death yet), she'd hardly be the first singer. Take a look at:
http://www.av1611.org/rockdead.html

A couple of examples:
Janis Joplin died in 1970, age 27, drug overdose.
Elvis, 1977, 42, drug overdose.
Look through the list--and note the many famous people who were left out. I'd have added Billie Holiday, 1959; Judy Garland, 1969. How many hundreds of actors, poets, writers, painters have died from overdoses? See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L..._drug-related_deaths for another list.

Nothing new here. Sadly.

quote:

On TV he was seen placing a non-demoniational charcoal cross on inmate foreheads.

That's reaching out? A meaningless televised ceremony? If it's non-denominational, why was it done on Ash Wednesday? And how do you distinguish a non-denominational charcoal cross from a denominational one?

Seems to me he could have thought of something more useful to do for the prisoners. Bring 'em a good meal, for example, or arrange for them to get laid. (Satan made me write that last part, BTW. The Lord will forgive me.)

Jeff

Jeff

Interesting note. In my 60 years in choirs, I have found several others of similar vintage. There is a control factor in commercial music that gets to people. My opinion.

Donald

BTW, only Roman Catholics apply ashes to the forehead on Ash Wednesday these days. So that wasn't a non-denominational service you observed. Some Christian denominations don't observe Ash Wednesday at all.

Source:

http://atheism.about.com/od/ea...n/p/AshWednesday.htm

Jeff

Jeff

For Methodists this is a recent addition to the rituals, at least here in New Mexico. There is a very nice RC Archbishop here, and maybe he worked something with the UMC Bishop?

I'm still not used to it, but I sing in the choir and joined the group with my black outfit, so why not a little washable charcoal cross on the forehead? I saw one proclaimed RC member who looked like hers was a Zia symbol, applied with a short, narrow-tooth comb. She was the billing clerk for my dentist, specifically said she was going to Mass at noon, but since most of those crosses are applied with a finger, I suspect some foul play, as with my billing.
:-(. Mine was real.

Even working people are doing strange things these days.

Donald

Jeff

BTW, Communion in RC, UMC, and other Protestant churches is open to all comers, including atheists and agnostics. This is not an event with the Church. It is supper with the Lion of Judah.

Donald

Jeff

Just a bit of history:

The Methodist Church was founded by John Wesley, who remained an Episcopal Priest all his life. The Episcopal churches were founded by English king Henry VIII over a marital dispute with the Pope, but the two groups still talk to each other.

Protestant churches tend to do their fragmentary thing.

Donald

The Episcopal Church observes Ash Wednesday as a Holy day and administers the ashes - some are even doing it on street corners. I think it reinforces the Lenten experience of denial and sacrifice.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/...IQAInWGTR_story.html

Unless things have changed recently, I don't think the Roman Catholic Church will administer the Eucharist knowingly to a protestant. They refused it to my Aunt, a very religious non- RC at the chapel in her retirement home just a few years ago. She was furious. I suspect she went to the altar to test them though...knowing her. She called me immediately, on my cell - indignant!

Once RC's would not acknowledge any Baptism but their own. The Baptist Church is the only other Christian church that I know of that only acknowledges their own Baptisms. If you aren't dunked, you aren't saved.

Peachy

The Anglican Church as we know it today was founded by Elizabeth I. (Henry III's daughter)

It is "Catholic" only in the more secular interpretation of the word...Universal. In liturgy it is similar but in theology it is different and far, far more liberal. Its Bishops adhere to the Apostolic line.

Some resources:

quote:

English Protestant church, of which she became the Supreme Governor. This Elizabethan Religious Settlement later evolved into today's Church of England.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elizabeth_I_of_England

The roots of the Church of England go back to the time of the Roman Empire when Christianity entered the Roman province of Britain. Through the influences of St Alban, St Illtud, St Ninian, St Patrick and, later, St Augustine, St Aidan and St Cuthbert, the Church of England developed, acknowledging the authority of the Pope until the Reformation in the 16th century.

The religious settlement that eventually emerged in the reign of Elizabeth I gave the Church of England the distinctive identity that it has retained to this day. It resulted in a Church that consciously retained a large amount of continuity with the Church of the Patristic and Medieval periods in terms of its use of the catholic creeds, its pattern of ministry, its buildings and aspects of its liturgy, but which also embodied Protestant insights in its theology and in the overall shape of its liturgical practice. The way that this is often expressed is by saying that the Church of England is both 'catholic and reformed.'

http://www.churchofengland.org/about-us/history.aspx

Peachy

God is the judge on Baptisms.

Muslims kill converts to Christianity.

Christians are divided on the importance of today's Israel. Some could care less.

Jews are still making active aliyah, even as the U.S. seems to be their right arm against Iran. Apparently Israel found a Muslim fall guy to do the dirty work in Iranian assassinations of nuclear scientists/leaders.

While Catholics do add a few barriers to Communion, even after the international/interdenomination conferences, from what I read, they do agree baptism is open to any who profess their belief in Christ Jesus. At the personal level anything can happen. I have watched quiet ladies in wheelchairs receive Communion from those supposedly trained and equipped to give it to them. I wondered if these Altzheimer residents even knew what was going on, although I understand many carry on their Bible reading, for whatever reason.
I always have an audience for secular or sacred music, but just one book a half hour visit. Only once did I have an activity director not allow any of her residents to come, although I had come regularly before, but then it was the Lenten season. (I was playing on my 120 bass piano accordion the Easter portions of Handel's Messiah.) I may yet get back there, as some were very unhappy I quit there.

That activity director is one of three very intolerant types who were either picky or did not fulfill agreements. The one for the above music actually stopped talking to me face to face (and presumably behind my back) when I suggested anything, always had her phone on answering service, but did once allow me to play in another area when a date conflict arose with another musical group from out of town. They are not all bad, had a large group of sick patients, and I think just got caught up in other sizeable headaches. I have gone back successfully to other similar situations with unavoidable barriers, which keeps this volunteer work interesting, as well as worth doing.

Donald

Peachy

I accept the correction. The separation by my sources was in 1534, and they are still talking. I watch with disgust the effort of the Chinese efforts to separate bonafide RC clergy with their own versions.

Donald

Donald, the link I gave says:

quote:

Ash Wednesday Today:

Christians are expected to engage in both fasting and abstinence on Ash Wednesday. Today only Roman Catholics continue with the tradition of applying ashes on Ash Wednesday, using the ashes created by the burning of palm fronds from the previous Palm Sunday. There are special church services on Ash Wednesday in Anglican, Lutheran, and some other Protestant churches. Eastern Orthodox churches do not observe Ash Wednesday at all because their Lent begins on a Monday, known as “Clean Monday.”

So Ash Wednesday is celebrated by other denominations, but only the RC applies crosses by ash to foreheads--according to this source anyway. Unless my source is wrong, of course, which is not unheard of on the Internet.

quote:

Muslims kill converts to Christianity.

That implies all Muslims are savage violent fundamentalists. Don't you think you should hedge that statement a bit?

Most converted Muslims are alive and well and have nothing to fear from their Muslim neighbors and friends.

Just as most who convert from Christianity to any other religion can sleep peacefully knowing they won't be killed as heretics.

Jeff

quote:

While Catholics do add a few barriers to Communion

A few?

You have to be a Catholic (except in extraordinary circumstances with specific exceptions made by a bishop). You have to be in a state of Grace. You have to have been to confession since your last mortal sin. And you have to had observed the Eucharistic Fast (a concept I knew nothing about until I looked this up a moment ago, by the way).

See:
http://www.catholic.com/tracts...an-receive-communion

quote:

Scripture is clear that partaking of the Eucharist is among the highest signs of Christian unity: "Because there is one bread, we who are many are one body, for we all partake of the one bread" (1 Cor. 10:17). For this reason, it is normally impossible for non-Catholic Christians to receive Holy Communion, for to do so would be to proclaim a unity to exist that, regrettably, does not.

Jeff

The date is 2004.

Christ died for us all. We all still share in that Mortal Sin.

We share in God's forgiveness if we accept it. How can anyone accept it if there is no open door.

Thanks for documenting RC restrictions.

Donald

[

quote:

Just as most who convert from Christianity to any other religion can sleep peacefully knowing they won't be killed as heretics.

Jeff

What is the date on your source?

There are extremists in most religions. I just finished watching the current Mother Teresa film. Great job, great filming, radical behavior rewarded with a Nobel Peace Prize.

Christ Jesus helped and healed whoever. Judas stole his money.
Peter betrayed him. These were his own people. Now there are over a billion RC Christians, from poor to the very rich, uneducated to as high as one can go. I saw an RC priest the other day, dreassed in the finest to the hilt, browsing in a book store. Who was he helping?

I'm writing off the top of my head, but I will post a web site for the non-demominal church I as a member helped to found. If you want to see extremist, take a look.
http://www.heritageabq.org/
I'm back in a United Methodist Church, singing in the choir the other didn't have, but I still talk and even work with them.

My belief is like Mother Teresa's. God is indeed in control, love continues to be central to life, and doing is the best expression.
I wouldn't miss your replies, or Linda's, or Peachy's, or anyone else here, although I may wait until I am ready to read them. If I get in a hurry, I'm like Linda. I lose some of my carefully considered replies, even if I saw something of the Holy Spirit moving in them. I saw something in Sela's even when I didn't agree with her all the time.

Onward,
Donald

I don't need a source to say that most Muslims are not going to kill converts, and most converts are safe in their beds from their neighbors. There are about 1.6 billion Muslims in the world. Do you really think that MOST of them would kill a convert to Christianity? What a sad world view that is. What a sad view of mankind that is.

quote:

Christ died for us all. We all still share in that Mortal Sin.

I do understand that you believe that. Do you understand that it makes no sense whatever to me? I'm alive. Christ didn't die for me. I wasn't born with any kind of sin. No baby is born sinning. IMHO there's no such thing as a sin for anyone. There are bad acts, sure, but not sins. I'm using the word "sin" here as meaning "deliberate disobedience to the known will of God" not its casual meaning of doing something wrong.

Jeff

Jeff

The absurd conclusion one might draw from your statement on Mortal Sin is that you have none, and therefore are the Christ/Antichrist.
I'm enjoying the conversation.

I did find a very lucid Muslim web-site on Muslims killing converts.
http://spa.qibla.com/issue_vie...=7&ID=9801&CATE=1427

It is interesting reading, and concludes that the peaceful should live in peace with other peaceful. Sounds good to me, and I am trying in my neighborhood.

The newsletter from Israel, Arutz Seven, today says another riotous INTIFADA is in full swing. The rioters say Israel is trying to take over the Temple Mount (presumably when the bridge from the Western Wall is restored/replaced). It also says that Syria should be easier to deal with if President Assad leaves his post.
www.Israelnationalnews.com

Yesterday greater rioting in Afghanistan was predicted in the news for today. Killing is going on over there.

Are happy days really here again?

Donald

quote:

The absurd conclusion one might draw from your statement on Mortal Sin is that you have none, and therefore are the Christ/Antichrist.

Or that everyone has none, and therefore we're all the Christ/Antichrist.

The notion that every newborn baby is born in sin is what is absurd.

Jeff

Jeff

We are all born with the capability to sin, which I think is the better statement. Even Jesus was born that way, but by witnesses never exercised that option.

All mankind will appear before God to be judged on how they did or did not use that capability, or the means to cleanse themselves from having committed it.

Sean's 510 billion people born over the eons certainly confounds the problem of Judgment. Yet the focus remains on Jerusalem/New Jerusalem, even though there already have been major dismembrances, even total destruction by the Romans after 70 AD. It is reasonable thus to assume there can be more, at least one more.

I personally as a long time choir member am glad God provides for new songs, as in angels playing their harps. The picture of King David as composure as well as playing artist and Israel's greatest king domonstrates that downfall is at some point certain, but few have the whole picture. The United Nations, however, demonstrates that mankind can come together for key and preferred notions of the future.

Donald

quote:

Even Jesus was born that way

Not if you're a Catholic. The whole doctrine of the Immaculate Conception was needed to show that Jesus wasn't born with original sin.

I doubt that one in ten Catholics understand that doctrine has to do with the birth of Mary, not the birth of Jesus. I keep telling Catholics about it. They all seem confused or ignorant about their own religion.

I guess I shouldn't be surprised.

If I had to pick, I'd say music was a product of Satan more than God. Satan has the better parties, and what's a party without dancing? (No, angels strumming harps isn't the same thing as hot dancing with a rock beat.)

Jeff

Jeff

This morning I had a great time with Jewish seniors as I played Neal Diamond songs.

My understanding is that Jesus had a human side and a divine side.
If he were really human, he would have been tempted, and recent pictures have picked up on a possible role for Mary Magdalene.

The few ladies of the night I have seen in hospitals have no love for men, but stories tell us her attitude supported Jesus.

The change in wording from the Apostolic Creed to the Nicene Creed shows how intense thinking challenges present ideas, enhancing nuances. It is easier to identify with the human than the divine, but trying in my mind is worth it.

quote:

All mankind will appear before God to be judged on how they did or did not use that capability, or the means to cleanse themselves from having committed it.

Why? If God is omnipresent and omnipotent, God knows what we're going to do before we do it. There's no need to appear and be judged. Judged for what? It's not like we have any say in what happens, if you believe in predestination.

And how would exchanging a few words with a priest cleanse you of horrible sins? If someone molests a thousand children or kills six million Jews, is it enough to go to find a priest to hear a confession and cleanse the sins? One of my favorite scenes in Bedazzled has Satan explaining that he thought he had Mussolini, but on his deathbed Mussolini said "Scusi. Me regretti" and up he flew!

What people believe is totally preposterous to me more often than not.

And of course I'm sure religious folks feel the same about what I believe.

Jeff

Jeff

This morning on the front entry carpet, with image having head pointed at front door like barking, is a picture in dog pee by a 40 lb female dog of a dog, about filling an 8 1/2 x 14 piece of paper. As it spread it looked more like a lion. (This is March 1, and the image is fresh.) The forecast for today is high winds, up to 60 mph. I did apparently step on the hind end before I saw it.
No, I didn't do it. Maybe Sela?

There is also an intriguing article this morning on what the drought in Texas is doing to annual bird migration, with numbers.
http://xfinity.comcast.net/art...irds/?cid=hero_media
New Mexico is also very dry with Firestorm Watchs today for State and us.

The weather report is worse for the eastern US, with severe and quick moving tornados, one even beating the police to the warning button in Illinois, with resultant death toll 9+ in a hamlet of 300.

Donald

Jeff

The monotheistic faiths have different views of the activity of God, with Christianity offering a more personal view. On the other hand, faith in each still works to bring God's Grace to bear.

As I understand Grace, God gave it to the Jews and brought them out of Egypt to enjoy Passover, the remembrance. Add Yom Kippur for the memory of what else is available, and that beautiful musical summary in the Kol Nidre.

Grace is used by God for Muslims when he weighs the Good vs. Bad in each person's life. Can you imagine the horror of a terrorist with all the virgins he is supposed to marry? But some really get happy with what they are able to get in this life, like oil, and to exercise the Blood Feud rights. Sometimes when they do, however, their memory is erased, as with Osama bin Laden.


OTOH, our country was built with that Grace, is made secure with continual advancements, and has the free speech to question everything taught us. Grace, however, has provided the wherewithal to punish those who step outside the box. Still, it is beautiful to see what was put into the music for the Kol Nidre, and that high note of hope at the end.

It is noteworth in the Christian Bible that everyone gets to be raised "incorruptible", and to appear before the Great White Throne to see if one's reward is written in the Book of Life.

I understand that there is a similar concept in the OT with the destination Jerusalem. An old man at Shalom House in Albuquerque, where I played Neil Diamond music recently, was telling me how the Jewish unhappiness over BCE and BC, etc., has been supplanted by the emphasis currently on the Millenium. He was concerned that he could not make Aliyah, though his two sons were working on it for him.

It appears the Republican House of Representatives could not convince the Democratic Senate to recognize the right of faith in abortions and similar in President Obama's health law. I haven't heard yet what the Supreme Court has said, if anything yet. Then comes the social reaction, probably the event of Spring.

Donald